"This is cold. Even for you", OR why we shouldn't believe everything in Let's Kill Hitler
I've always wondered what the quote in the title was about, because although the Doctor does things that can change lives for the worse, or even end them, I'd never say they were cold. "Cold" means "heartless", and the Doctor's got two.
This weekend, on my fourth watch of an episode I thought I didn't like, everything began to make sense.
When I first saw Let's Kill Hitler, I was too excited to think straight anything, all BOUNCE BOUNCE BOUNCY. The second time I watched it, I realised what I felt: the same way I did when I read the last Harry Potter book; too much of Underplot, not enough of Overplot. It was a very *functional* episode, but too functional. Like a Swiss army knife that's got so much on it you can't use it properly because it's too big. The third time, I watched it with my sister as entertainment: something I'd watch if it was just, y'know, on. During the fourth viewing, when she was more awake, she said, "What does he do in that change?"
That made me start thinking about what actually happens in this episode.
In Let's Kill Hitler, there's River, and Tardis abuse and Hitler in a cupboard and a ROBOT FULL OF TINY PEOPLE and SURPRISE PARENTING SKILLZ! and more River and then she poisons the Doctor, goes on the run, is a bit cray cray on the streets of 1930s Berlin, while the Doctor goes all Ten-like emo in his Tardis and River's parents get stuck in a robot version of her mother. Mother saves daughter, daughter saves mother, daughter saves boyfriend, The End. HURRAY, almost everyone lives. Ironically, for Nazi-occupied Germany, almost everyone lives.
BUT. If I was a Jonathan Creek fan then I'd know better. If Jonathan Creek taught me anything, it'd that if it looks like a locked room, they either never got out or they never got in; not everything is as it seems. And I am SUCH a fan. So even though this episode runs smoothly, from one surprising/exciting/WHAT THE HELL event to the next, there are some things that you handwave away for not quite working. And that's exactly why you shouldn't handwave them."Sorry? Did you say she killed the Doctor? The Doctor? Doctor Who?"
"You're dying. And you stopped to change?!" "Oh! You should always waste time when you don't have any. Time is not the boss of you. Rule 408."
Neither of those sound like a man who's dying. Or answering the question. They sound like a man thoroughly removed from it all who's got a plan, and time. Except he doesn't, and he's dying. We've just seen him with Amelia "Voice Interface" Pond, pulling a lever - once she's said the magic words - that ends up with him arriving in that dining hall with some dashing clobber on. And then he sorts everything out, and then dies for a bit.
We know Eleven. We know he'd jump at the chance to wear a fancy hat and surprise everybody, even when he's dying. We know he's dying (how could we not after all that dying acting?) and we know that River saves him, because of all that gold
stuff and then he's alive and stuff.
But what if? What if that's not what happens? What if the Doctor isn't even poisoned at all?"Rule 1. The Doctor lies."
This weekend, on my fourth watch of an episode I thought I didn't like, everything began to make sense.
When I first saw Let's Kill Hitler, I was too excited to think straight anything, all BOUNCE BOUNCE BOUNCY. The second time I watched it, I realised what I felt: the same way I did when I read the last Harry Potter book; too much of Underplot, not enough of Overplot. It was a very *functional* episode, but too functional. Like a Swiss army knife that's got so much on it you can't use it properly because it's too big. The third time, I watched it with my sister as entertainment: something I'd watch if it was just, y'know, on. During the fourth viewing, when she was more awake, she said, "What does he do in that change?"
That made me start thinking about what actually happens in this episode.
In Let's Kill Hitler, there's River, and Tardis abuse and Hitler in a cupboard and a ROBOT FULL OF TINY PEOPLE and SURPRISE PARENTING SKILLZ! and more River and then she poisons the Doctor, goes on the run, is a bit cray cray on the streets of 1930s Berlin, while the Doctor goes all Ten-like emo in his Tardis and River's parents get stuck in a robot version of her mother. Mother saves daughter, daughter saves mother, daughter saves boyfriend, The End. HURRAY, almost everyone lives. Ironically, for Nazi-occupied Germany, almost everyone lives.
BUT. If I was a Jonathan Creek fan then I'd know better. If Jonathan Creek taught me anything, it'd that if it looks like a locked room, they either never got out or they never got in; not everything is as it seems. And I am SUCH a fan. So even though this episode runs smoothly, from one surprising/exciting/WHAT THE HELL event to the next, there are some things that you handwave away for not quite working. And that's exactly why you shouldn't handwave them."Sorry? Did you say she killed the Doctor? The Doctor? Doctor Who?"
"You're dying. And you stopped to change?!" "Oh! You should always waste time when you don't have any. Time is not the boss of you. Rule 408."
Neither of those sound like a man who's dying. Or answering the question. They sound like a man thoroughly removed from it all who's got a plan, and time. Except he doesn't, and he's dying. We've just seen him with Amelia "Voice Interface" Pond, pulling a lever - once she's said the magic words - that ends up with him arriving in that dining hall with some dashing clobber on. And then he sorts everything out, and then dies for a bit.
We know Eleven. We know he'd jump at the chance to wear a fancy hat and surprise everybody, even when he's dying. We know he's dying (how could we not after all that dying acting?) and we know that River saves him, because of all that gold
stuff and then he's alive and stuff.
But what if? What if that's not what happens? What if the Doctor isn't even poisoned at all?"Rule 1. The Doctor lies."